“The Opportunity and Inclusive Growth Institute is an important research initiative focusing on some of the most pressing economic issues we face as a nation. This work has the potential to help more Americans find real economic opportunity. I hope that scholars inside and outside the Federal Reserve System will contribute to this important work,” said Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen.
The Institute, based at the Minneapolis Fed, is a long-term commitment designed to engage a broad range of scholars. It will look beyond aggregate economic indicators in order to examine how national policies impact diverse communities of people within the U.S. economy. Such scholarship will allow the Federal Reserve System to better achieve one of its primary missions – maximum employment – and generate important new insights for other policymakers and the public.
“Travelling around the Ninth District has helped me understand the economic challenges that we face in our region. Too many families rightly feel that their kids don’t have access to a bright future. While this Institute will bring together the best academic scholarship from around the nation, the intended effect is on the personal level, helping families and communities improve their prospects,” said Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari.
Board of Advisors
The Institute will adopt a multidisciplinary approach that includes the participation of leading academics from a variety of fields, including economics, education, law, public health, public policy and sociology. A distinguished group of academics have joined the advisory board to help launch the Institute. The inaugural board includes:
- David Autor, Ford Professor of Economics and Associate Head of the Department of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Marianne Bertrand, Chris P. Dialynas Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business
- Raj Chetty, Professor of Economics at Stanford University
- Janet Currie, Henry Putnam Professor of Economics and Public Affairs and Director of the Center for Health and Well Being at Princeton University
- William “Sandy” Darity Jr., Samuel DuBois Cook Professor of Public Policy, African and African American Studies, and Economics and Director of the Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity at Duke University
- Esther Duflo, the Abdul Latif Jameel Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics in the Department of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a co-founder and co-director of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL)
- Kathryn Edin, Bloomberg Distinguished Professor in the Department of Sociology, Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and Department of Population, Family, and Reproductive Health, Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University
- Philip Jefferson, Centennial Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at Swarthmore College
- Greg Kaplan, Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago
- Lawrence Katz, Elisabeth Allison Professor of Economics at Harvard University
- Edward Lazear, Jack Steele Parker Professor of Human Resources Management and Economics at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business and Morris Arnold and Nona Jean Cox Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution
- Glenn Loury, Merton P. Stoltz Professor of the Social Sciences and Professor of Economics at Brown University
- Sara McLanahan, William S. Tod Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton University
- Myron Orfield, the Earl R. Larson Professor of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Law and Director of the Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity at the University of Minnesota
- Robert Putnam, Peter and Isabel Malkin Professor of Public Policy at Harvard University and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government
- Emmanuel Saez, Chancellor’s Chair in Tax Policy and Public Finance and the Director of the Center for Equitable Growth at the University of California, Berkeley
- William Spriggs, Chief Economist to the AFL-CIO and Professor of Economics at Howard University
- Ebonya Washington, Professor of Economics at Yale University
- David Wilcox, Director of Research and Statistics Division at the Federal Reserve System Board of Governors
Board members will help the Institute by identifying topics where the Federal Reserve System can make a significant contribution and by recruiting Visiting Scholars. In the future, the Board’s support will grow and adjust according to the needs of the Institute and the direction of developing scholarship.
Visiting Scholar program
The Institute will invite a small group of Ph.D. scholars to pursue research alongside Federal Reserve economists while in residence at the Minneapolis Fed. Scholars will be selected based upon a research proposal related to the Institute’s mission.
- Visiting Scholars. Beginning in fall 2017, early-career scholars will reside at the Minneapolis Fed for one academic year.
- Senior Visiting Scholars. For senior scholars, a flexible residence ranging from two to three months up to a full year is available.
Conference series
The Minneapolis Fed will host the first conference in a series dedicated to exploring topics related to the Institute’s mission on May 22, 2017. The first conference will include a discussion about the Federal Reserve’s comparative advantage in fostering inclusive growth, through either monetary policy or other contributions to the public policy discourse. Subsequent conferences will be organized to highlight the emerging research of advisory board members, visiting scholars, and other experts.
Working paper series
The work of the Institute will include a new working paper series that will highlight the efforts of scholars within the Federal Reserve System on issues related to economic opportunity and inclusive growth with the aim of promoting scholarly debate and soliciting constructive feedback.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis is one of 12 regional Reserve Banks that, with the Board of Governors in Washington, D.C., make up the Federal Reserve System, the nation’s central bank. The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis is responsible for the Ninth Federal Reserve District, which includes Montana, North and South Dakota, Minnesota, northwestern Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis participates in setting national monetary policy, supervises numerous banking organizations, and provides a variety of payments services to financial institutions and the U.S. government.